Gratuitous expense

By B.R.

ONE of the things that shocks nearly every first-time visitor to America is just how pervasive its tipping culture is. The frequency and scale of expected gratuities in the country is an oft-rolled-out lament on this blog and on every other travel website. But what Gulliver hadn’t realised, until browsing HotelChatter, is that there are trade guidelines on how much guests should leave, and the level to which they have risen.

The American Hotel & Lodging Association, a trade body, publishes a “Gratuity Guide”, with suggested rates that can make one wince. Examples include up to $2 per person for the driver of the shuttle bus from the airport to the hotel; as much as $5 per bag for porters; door staff, meanwhile, should expect up to $2 for the onerous task of flexing their fingers at one of the taxis queued up right outside; and housekeeping should be left up to $5 a night. Top of the heap is the concierge. His suggested rate is $5 for booking a guest a table in a restaurant and $10 if he has something more difficult to do, like find a tricky theatre ticket.

Indeed, Gulliver just asked his American colleague if he could name a single person that a traveller deals with at a hotel who wouldn’t expect a tip. After a long pause, the only one he could name was the person who shows you to your table in the restaurant. (Which seems an unforgivable oversight; one that the American Hotel & Lodging Association should rectify forthwith.) And that, of course, comes on top of all those people one tips as a matter of course everywhere, such as waiters (although with 20% now becoming normal in the States, they can still expect a much higher rate than virtually anywhere else in the world).

This is not to suggest that it is a racket. Serving staff are often paid below minimum wage and are expected to make that up with tips. But it makes a tightwad like Gulliver thoroughly depressed. It can feel as if one is moulting dollar bills with every step at an American hotel. But at least, it could be argued, there are firm guidelines. In Britain, tipping is still an ad-hoc affair. And that lack of certainty can lead to a different feeling of awkwardness, as visitors are unsure of whether they are appearing miserly or gauche. TripAdvisor’s tipping and etiquette guide to Britain suggests giving the porter £2 ($3) in total, but definitely not leaving extra for things such as room service. (It also, rather quaintly, advises visitors not to raise their middle fingers to locals as this could be “highly insulting”, and that when eating in the UK “it is usual to use cutlery in order to get food from plate to mouth.”)

It would be nice to think that at some point the world will come to its senses, and porters, waiters and the like will be rewarded for good service with a decent basic wage. That might even be in a hotel’s interest. Studies have suggested that customers don’t tend to vary their gratuities much so, as one restaurateur on qz.com puts it, “tipped servers, in turn, learn that service quality isn’t particularly important to their revenue. Instead they are rewarded for maximising the number of guests they serve, even though that degrades service quality.”

The only other thing that might stop this madness is the rise of robotic hotel staff. Still, it won't be long before they too will come to expect a squirt of penetrating oil in return for showing guests where in their room the toilet can be found.